[chrisk82]

hello people. I'm just wondering the most effective way to accurately and proportionaly pose a character. I have a book: "Dynamic Figure Drawing", which is good, but a little complicated and uses more real examples. So if anyone could help, Please do. I can't be the only one on here with this kind of problem

------------------
Chris Konchalski
www.geocities.com/clk8211

[surphun]

well, yeah. I have the same problem as you. that's the reason I'm stuck drawing rubber ducks..heh. they dont' move too quickly. I do know a few things:
1) I've heard bad things about that Dynamic Figure Drawing book in this forum...dunno from who

2) I heard doing figure drawings the "Marvel way" is bad on the forum too.

2) You should talk to Mozeman and look at his posts about life drawings. He could probably help you out the most with this.

[craig]

chrisk82,

the one thing that I know, that I have read
about, is that you want your figure to
be at the extreme point of action for
whatever it is that he/she/it is doing.
For instance, if you want to portray someone
running don't draw them vertically in mid
stride, but leaning dramatically (but
realistically) forward. The arms would
be at extreme points of swing, one leg
bent up close to the body, the other leg
at complete extension.

If you want to have a figure turning around,
for example you would draw at maximum pivot
with the head and shoulders swung with the
most difference between the rotation of the
hips and legs.

The extreme point of the movement/action is what you want to capture....so I have been told!
Hope that helps

c

[Anthony]

Hogarth, ugh. ^_^ Why don't you go sketch at the mall, or a martial arts tourney-those are good places to watch people move around and sketch them.

------------------
-Anthony
Carpe Carpem

[AliasMoze]

Chrisk82,
There is no magic formula.
But if you want to draw figures, here's some things you can do:
1.) Draw figures from life. As Anthony said, go out to the park or mall and practice drawing people in motion. Speed is obviously important. This kind of drawing is essential. Go for the broadest pose and focus on communicating the pose first.

In other words, when you look at someone standing there or walking, imagine if you had to quickly jot down his/her stance so that you could communicate it to a friend of yours.

2.) Get "Bridgman's Life Drawing" by George Bridgman. It's an incredibly cheap book and is one of the better books on building a figure from scratch.

3.) Get involved with Mozeman's life drawing thread. I work with Mozeman, and if you don't take advantage of the opportunity of a free class from him, then you'll regret it.

The Marvel book isn't bad. However, I would advise against learning to draw from comics. Superheros have exaggerated proportions; learn the rules before you break them. I'm not a big fan of Hogarth, but his book couldn't hurt.

I guess my best advice is to learn the human form and the parts that make it up. In poses, there are three main moveable pieces -- the head, the torso, and the pelvis. Just learn how these relate to each other in various situations.

Hope that helps. Good luck learning

------------------
AliasMoze
:) :) :) :)
"That activates my hilarity unit."

[freddy flicks stones]

Posing figures is a complicated subject. It is basically figure drawing. Do you take any life drawing classes? If not, then you may run into some difficulties. The biggest being, if you have never done it right before from reference, then making it up is going to be next to hopeless to figure out correctly. You can start with hogarth or marvel drawing, or whatever supplement you can find that will get you started, but even in those books are going to point out that there is no real substitute for the real deal. I teach figure drawing, and I still have a difficult time inventing poses without a frame of reference. I can guess, but that's all it will ever look like. An educated guess. While all the posing I am comfortable with because I have drawn it before at some point is going to look relaxed, better defined in terms of what is necessary to put down on papaer to get the most accurate results etc. Fact is, you can guess, but you can never substitute for the real thing. THe great comic artists use reference constantly. Whether it be a pose from some mag, or they get their friends and family to "strike a pose for a moment" to get the right angle, design, musculature, etc...
In terms of what to start with in drawing the figure, use simple forms. Ball, or oval for the head, chest and pelvic region, cylinders for the arms and legs, and neck, and wedges for the feet and hands. This info is broken down for you in the How to draw comics the marvel way, and in many other figure anatomy for artists books. As for posing, if you have no classes you can take to get the true experience you need, then get a friend or family member and have them hold the pose for you and quick sketch it, or polaroid photograph it for instant access to the reference. Then be careful of all the do's and dont's with using photos for reference, too many to even get started with now. Or get one of those goofy wooden puppet artist dolls and start with that. But be careful of even that. Those things have limited range and motion, where we have far more flexibility than those things.
So like I said, there is no deal than the real deal. Life drawing. All the animators use it. Comic book artists should be using it more than most of those premadonnas do. And illustrators, fine artists, storyboard artists, etc all study from life. If they didn't their craft wouldn't take on a convincing appearance, and they wouldn't get work.
Good luckto you and I hope that this helps a bit. I know it's probably not the answer you were hoping for, but then again,art is not an easy road to walk...but it can be one of the most rewarding in the long run, if you can endure the training,which in most cases is the funnest time you will have in all your career. Ahhh to exlore again...

[burn0ut]

hey what is a premadonna anyways, ive always wanted to know but never figured it out

[freddy flicks stones]

Iam better than all of you little dweebs who think you know what your doing, but I really do and you dont.
But the reality is that I don't really know all that much, I just suck up real well and fake it that I am cool and do my job better than anyone can, and am better than all.
Burnout, that is a premadonna from their point of view first, then the ugly truth second. Comic book artists suffer from this. Not all of them, just most of them...unfortunately I never caught this bug, or I too would be some thoughtless kook, looking down upon all who don't draw comics and think to myself, what poor souls. I will freshen up their day with some wonderful "ASS" story telling, enlighten them with some meaning(LESS)ful story telling and hope they can salvage their day with my hopes of positive human endeavor, with really big oversized guns, rediculous spandex suits, and stiff poses that tell nothing of a story what so ever...um bitter? Well, no, just dissapointed in them,many who started off as my friends, then decided to stop learning and go on the road to autographic fame, with no real training, and well, now where are they, tehehe...evil me

[Muzman]

a prima donna is the female lead in an opera producton. In the old days they were stars, travelling all over europe and drawing huge crowds. Subsequently they would be groomed and pampered by all the regional opera companies trying to garner their services. In order to woo them they would be given a huge staff and all the perks of food, clothes, transport, men etc just to get them into a production.
The culture developed in a way that such things could be demanded by a famous singer. So often the livelihood of a production and the company depended on them and the hundreds of other performers, musicians, staff, composers and organisers in the company would have to defer to the prima donna's fame for the sake of their occupations.
it's a lot like rock stars and movie stars today
Thus the term became associated with high falutin people who get everything handed to them and whose name is more of a selling point than their skill.

[Muzman]

oops! I must refresh more often

[AliasMoze]

Hahahaha. Bitter?
I've only been to one comic convention with two animator friends of mine. I was amazed at what a-holes the artists were to the fans. The funny thing was that everyone in my group was a better artist than most of the comic artist there.

But I guess these guys are worshipped by the fans and let the image get to them. Too bad for them.

My favorite artist is probably David Michellini (sp?), who is not one of the guys that everyone names right away. But the guy is very cinematic and can tell a story visually like nobody's business. And I don't even like comic books.

------------------
AliasMoze
:) :) :) :)
"That activates my hilarity unit."

[Nex]

*takes one careful step back and looks for an exit*

"sure Fred, sure..., they are all worms.."
"and it was not right from them to pour pig-blood over you on your prom night..."
"Don't you think you should put that nuke down and we talk about it?"

[Rinaldo]

hmmmm.... everyone seems to think that life drawing is the key to good posing.

While this is undeniably an integral part of the "recipe" it is by no means an answer to your problems and in my opinion can actuialy drive you into a corner.
For example: how many artists can draw perfect anatomy but have realy boring "poses" (and I think pose the word that is under scrutiny here)... more than I care to mention, boris, chris moore, jim burns, etc. etc. so on, so forth. yes they are all sucsessful yes they are all famous but boy are they boring.
crisk82- I noticed your picture of the starwars character. I Will attempt to use this as an example. What this picture is lacking is drama, when I see it I can recognize what it is but it has no character. when posing a character you have to get inside it's head. What is so cool about that starwars design (I'm sorry I don't know what it's called). it definitly has a lot of apeal in its form, but it wouldn't be utilizing the feel of the character to have him dancing a jig. what comes to mind is the color crimson (not red "crimson") color evokes an emotional response, and red creates anxiety, use that color to full extent. this may not have anything to do with posing a character but it should play into how you represent it. what kind of objrct/character you are portraying will play into how you draw it. it is also usefull to have some reason to be drawing something, be it to tell a story, to evoke an emotion, or whatever. you then have to put youreself in the character's place. if he is wounded how would he react. once you have the image in your head explore it pose yourself in the position see how the rest of your body respods with secondary action. A digital camera can be a god send.

this is all well and good but sometimes you just can't draw what is inside your head. I have often found myself compramising on a pose because I just can't draw it, opting for something more generic and static. this is something to watch out for. there are a ton of comic artists who are drawing the same face, the same pose, from the same angle over and over again. they may have a couple of poses in their repertoire, but they are baisicaly drawing from memory, they are not seeing their subject as a three dimensional object just remebering lines that when colated look okay.

You will have to do some life drawing to understand anatomy that is a given, but then you have to take that knowlage and put it to use, becase unless you are going to use photo referance, when it comes down to it all that's there is you and a blank picture plane

you could try hogarth but just remember to go into it with the mind set that the guy is often wrong. he tries to categorize everything and put it all in neat little boxes when you just can't. frank frazetta said that he just talked to much, he always saw something in everything. what he does offer is a system that workes for a wide range of styles, you could for instance use hogarth to draw manga becase he gives very broad outlines and then refines them. but a lot of his stuff is just wrong, I think sometimes he relied to much on his own rules and just couldn't see what he was drawing.

A usefull analogy is that painting is just like acting. you have to be your character to portray them. don't try to draw a happy face when you feel sad, even if you are good enough to get the smile right your lines will often be sad. there will just be somehting about it that does'nt look right.

I hoepe this is what you were lookiing for, or at least you found it usefull.
the real trick is to paractice drawing all the time so that when that perfect picture apears in your head you can let it flow seamlessly onto your empty page.

[freddy flicks stones]

Thanks for the real definition Muzman. It is a tad lighter than mine. I am really not all that bitter, I do comics myself, but I had a harder time earlier on when the money was better, when I studied my butt off learning the human form and storytelling, and all these high school fan boys got the jobs. What I come to find is that hiring real talent costs real money, and the fan boys will take what ever standard the industry pays them. But they don't ask the qualified if they would be willing to start at ground pay too to get their feet wet, they just tell them to "move along, nothing to see here..." in a Cheif Wigam voice...
I am a bit bitter, but not as much as I once was. i am humbler now because I still have a job, and see many more in the future, and my fun comic friends who made their quick cash spent it all and are looking for work now...I say no more...

[Hurri-cane]

Fred....dont u think a bit much of your self...i dont know if u where joking but, come on !! your not that super talented...
(oh boy, now is everybody gonna hate me)

[synj]

make sure all penises are locked in the upright position at all times.

[surphun]

synj: first off, hahaha!!
ok.
fred: I would take your job any day over a comic artist. I Just think your job would allow more creative freedom because your not stuck to sticking to a certain style or abiding by certain rules to keep your job..hell, if you wanted too, you could probably stick that indian guy in your tutorials in myst, couldn't you? :P

[ozenzo]

Hey hurricane-Fred didn't mean that literaly
he was just being poetic in his demonstration of what a premadonna is...he did this in the first person to show what a premadonna might say, and what they're attitude would be ..go back an reread what he says...you'll see what I mean.

[Anthony]

Don't just draw people at their most extreme poses though-watch someone do a certain set movement, then sketch a short animation of it. This will get you to look at how the character got to that pose. It will also force you to think about how likely that pose it to be. A stupid example: If you draw a guy in a suit with a briefcase, and he doesn't look like he's balancing quite right, if you draw the walk cycle around that pose you can work out where you went wrong. Sometimes. ^_^
Another very useful tool is "feeling" yourself in that pose when you're drawing it. This has proven difficult for some people, but if you feel yourself into that position(mentally), you can generally feel if something's wrong(damn, my arm hurts. Oh wait, it's twisted around my ankle!). You can even do this when first starting to draw, if you have a good image of what you want.

------------------
-Anthony
Carpe Carpem